GST to pay for high medical cost

Gay: Sir, any chance that the GST increase be postponed since the people will be tightening their belt?

Heng, feeling indignant: The GST increase is to address rising health care cost due to an ageing population. We can spend, take on debt, and make our future generations pay for it. Is that fair?

Gay, stonewalled by such a high horsey response, tries another tack.

Gay: Sir, seems like the people will be paying to get us out of this hole. I understand we have a huge reserve, can’t we use that to tie us over?

Heng: I don’t foresee the need for an extra-ordinary budget.

So, there you have it. We are in safe hands.

Foong Swee Fong

 

Above is a quote from an article by Foong Swee Fong on why GST must be raised. Not sure if the question and answer narrative is real of just a satire. But it is not far from the truth as far as the govt's position on the need to raise GST to cover the rising cost of oldies needing more medical services and govt needing to pay or subsidise the rising medical cost.

Other than raising GST, it was suggested that the reserves be drawn down, of course not everything, but a limited sum that would not bankrupt the reserves. The answer is still no.

By the way, what is causing the medical cost to go up? Who is causing the medical cost to go up? If the rich want to have the best medical facilities and services, they can opt to go to private hospitals and pay for them.  For the general public, many cannot afford the luxury or want or need the luxury. They just need basic medical facilities and services, no need for 5 star hotel quality of care and services.

If only basic and necessary facilities and services are provided, why should medical cost be going up, up and up? And in terms of services, many of the medical stuff are from third world countries and their salaries are already a saving in cost. There is no need to pay for 5 star services to be served by third world staff.

Is the govt unable to control the rising cost in govt hospitals? Oh, oh, they are run like private hospitals, subject to supply and demand and commercial pricing....I see. The govt is hapless and cannot do anything, just like rising cost of living, rising prices of HDB, rising fees and charges.

 I rest my case. Cannot win an argument against the most talented millionaires aka the govt.

How much have been collected from the compulsory CPF Medical Insurance Schemes and how much have been paid out? Net loss or net gain? Or they are collecting now, from the people now, to pay for the future needs of the future generation?

Fuel prices are up, transport fares are up, what else is up in a crisis when many people are losing their jobs, businesses are closing downs, our nations of shopkeepers losing money everyday, our national treasure, the hawkers, not scientists or highly skilled professions, are also going broke. 

What does this tell of the financial health of the country, the national reserves? The billions they are paying the foreigners to manage our funds, what was the return, or what was the loss? Providing jobs to make foreigners millionaires using our reserves, how much did the millionaire foreigners bring in from their expertise, more or less than what we paid them?

If the return is so good, why the need to keep on raising fares and taxes in a time like this?

 

 

Why would a government be so stupid to remove the Estate Duties (or any duties and tax)?

 

There are no good reasons to want to remove the Estate Duties and unnecessarily lost a portion of the government's income. Unless, of course, the Tax Department is too lazy to do the tedious work of going through hundreds and thousands of pages of supporting documents and evidences to scrutinise and verify the Declarations made on behalf of the Deceased?

The official reason that was given for doing away the Estate Duties is that the amount collected from Estate Duties is too small and therefore the government can absorb the loss of this stream of revenue. This is absurdity!

But, but, but, think deeper.

This may not be absurd if the top people in government have something to benefit from it, isn't it?

Or, probably something they wish to hide from public scrutiny?

The removal of the Estate Duties does not only benefits the Millionaire Ministers, Top Millionaire Civil Servants and other filthy rich people in Singapore monetarily. Its removal also, at the same time, in one swift single stroke, did away with the Compulsory Declaration of ALL Assets held in the name of the Deceased and those being held by other people on his behalf, e.g. public or private company's and whatever foundation's assets and profits from which the Deceased could be a beneficiary.

All declarations are to include assets held in foreign land and locally.

By doing away with the Estate Duties, all those millionaires, billionaires and filthy rich people can hide their real worth, past false declarations, discrepancies, self-incriminating evidences, or illegal activities from the Inland Revenues Public Records. In other words, the public will never be able to scrutinise their past illegal actions and sins, if any.

What a masterstroke!


SSO.

Singapore Education - Chasing after meaningless glory at what price?

An update to the Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings for 2021 ranked the National University of Singapore (NUS) as the 6th most international university in the world, while Nanyang Technological University (NTU) comes in at 9th.

What does this mean?

Well, according to the THE website, the ranking of the most international universities takes into account a university’s proportions of international students, international staff, journal publications with at least one international co-authors, and a university’s international reputation. All these pillars are given equal weight in the calculation of rankings.

For clarification, a university’s international reputation is the measure of “the proportion of votes from outside the home country that the institution achieved in THE’s annual invitation-only Academic Reputation Survey”, according to the website.

Back in 2019, TOC raised a concern about the ratio of international to local students in autonomous universities—like NUS and NTU. Based on figures from the Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) website—a different yet equally respected global ranking—it seemed that about 25 percent of NUS’ spots went to international students. A similar ratio was recorded by QS for NTU.

This year, based on data from THE for 2021, about 26 percent of students at NUS are international students. THE records the number of full-time equivalent students enrolled in NUS at 30,493.

 

Above is quoted from singaporenewslive.com. Singapore now has the bragging right to be number 6 and number 9 in the world as international universities. So, what is so great about being ranked highly as an international university? Is it the same as useless piece of degree that cannot be eaten? As reported about, the ranking is based on number of international students and international staff. These two criteria means more university places for foreigners instead of Singaporeans, more international academic staff instead of Singaporeans.

We have often heard of the grievances of parents having to empty their life savings to send their childre overseas because they could not get into local universities, ie being deprived of the precious place by foreign students. And many local academics have lost their jobs to foreign academics. In the first case, who pays for the foreign students to study here, the foreign students or Singapore, how much it costs to bring in so many foreign students to steal the place that should rightly be reserved for Singaporeans, the children of tax payers?

Secondly, how many Singaporean academics have lost their jobs to foreign academics and ended up unemployed or underemployed? Why create good paying jobs for foreigners and places for foreign students just to have a fictitious and practically useless reputation of being a top rank international universities? Worth it? How much it cost to Singapore, to parents, how many jobs lost to Singaporeans that needed the jobs?

What is so good or so valuable or so financially rewarding to win such ranks? Is the cost worth it for such superficial glory? Can be eaten or not?

The cost over the years are in hundreds of billions and the pyschological and financial impact of this pro foreigner policy, at the expense of Singaporean students and good jobs for Singaporeans is another Uniquely Singapore Stupidity has no cure policy. Educating foreigners to steal our lunch, providing good jobs to foreigners instead of Singaporeans just for a stupid, meaningless ranking.

What do you think? Should billions of public money be spent on this stupid and useless title of being a top international university at the expense of university places for our tax paying Singaporeans and the loss of good jobs for our own academics?

The Pathetic And Tragic State Of PAP IBs

Afraid of being exposed, the PAP IBs have gone underground, using Anonymous as their moniker.

Unable to see daylight, they behave like shaddy, cowardly, slimy creepy creatures of the dark.

Without the guts, integrity nor honour to show their identity, they hide under Anonymity because they know that they are without any credibility and their words can never to taken seriously by the public.

Worst of all, they don't even have the ability to make any sensible statement. So much so, they resorted to plagiarism, cut and paste wholesale articles from the mouth pieces of the PAP, and from other people's Facebook postings, lowering their own integrity, dignity and credibility even further.

Such is the poor, pathetic and tragic state of affairs with the useless pest-like PAP IBs.

Whatever money spent on them are solely and soullessly wasted. If the money had came from public funding through annual budget allocation to a certain statutory board organisation, then this is not only wastage of public funds but probably criminal too.

What do you think?


SSO - 1 November 2021.

Covid19 - Hong Kong steps up isolation measures to the dismay of 'lepers'

 AFP spoke to six senior managers at international companies to gauge whether - as one banking lobby group warned last week - Hong Kong's long-term viability as a business hub is at risk.

Hong Kong and China continue to impose strict control of 'lepers' ie Covid diseased visitors into the country to the dismay of the 'lepers' around the world. China's policy of zero Covid, achieved after very tough measures and self denials and sacrifices, is an outstanding example of successful control of the virus. Having done that, China would not give up and relax and allow the 'lepers' of the world to bring the virus to infect the Chinese people.

The strict movement measures have made 'lepers' that are living with the virus in their bodies very unhappy and starting to spread lies and ills about how Hong Kong would miss out in the world economy by not allowing the 'lepers' in. They are spreading the usual white lies that Hong Kong would lose out as a business hub to other 'leper' competitors. 

Unfortunately these lies would not work as real businesses would go on with or without the travel restriction measures. Anyone wanting to do business has to go to China where the action is. Opening up does not guarantee more business but increasing the risk of spreading the virus, something that China would not allow to happen inside China.

As the 'lepers' took refuge in their virus infected countries and pretending to be happy with the infection and the deaths in their midst, they would want China to share their misery as the new normal. How long would this pandemic continues, how damaging would be the virus on the reckless and irresponsible opening up of countries, exposing the people to the virus, are yet to be seen. The virus is not going to stop at Delta variant and more infectious and deadly variants can be expected to pop up. 

In a way this is nature's way of reducing the world's population with a substantial number of people willing to accept that dying due to the virus is a way of life. 10 years, 50 years or further down the road, the choice of living with the virus versus the choice of not living with the virus will take its toll on the population of the world. Who would come up better from these decisions only time will tell.

The world is likely to be divided between the 'lepers' colonies and the non lepers living in their respective worlds. And business would go on as usual. The lepers would like the non lepers to be diseased like lepers but not the other way round. 

China and Greater China are big enough a bubble for the Chinese to live their own way of life, free from the virus, going about their lives without masks or regular jabs of half past six vaccines, very low infection and very few deaths caused by the virus. Which is a better and normal way of life?